


eyes up here, gender over there

by yonderdarling



Series: Doctor/Missy Oneshots [6]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alien Gender/Sexuality, Gen, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Genderfluid Character, like just friendship fluff really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-12
Updated: 2017-04-12
Packaged: 2018-10-18 01:15:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10606260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yonderdarling/pseuds/yonderdarling
Summary: One minute, you're a Time Lord, the next you're exiled from Gallifrey and separated from your friends and family. Ten thousand years later and one table over, you're a Time Lady with fantastic taste in coffee and literature.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [auroralmelody](https://archiveofourown.org/users/auroralmelody/gifts).



> Written for auroral-melody, who is wonderful, and was feeling a bit down one day. Unbetaed.

In certain corners of the universe, there are hidden places. A close Earth term would perhaps be gentleman's clubs, but they're not for gentlemen. Sure, gentlemen may come, but it is such a limited term to describe someone. Beings of a certain calibre, intelligence and bank account balance are permitted knowledge of these hidden places. The higher echelons of this select calibre are actually allowed entry.

"I'm not one to question this place's guidelines, I mean, I get the long pants rule," says the Doctor, nodding to the eight-legged alien slithering past the table. "But that kid over there isn't a day over a hundred and twenty-seven. The redhead kid at table Iota."

Missy purses her lips.

"Don't look, right now," says the Doctor, making a show of looking away from the kid, looking at Missy's book. "He's looking at us."

"Raise your glass, you could get lucky."

"I think I know his taste, and it skews younger," the Doctor says, and Missy frowns at him, tilts her head. "I think he likes blondes. Blondes with ponytails who think the ponytails make them look cool and off-kilter, but they just look like they need to wash their hair."

The Doctor takes a slow sip of Mandragorian Hayauxilian-roasted coffee, flavoured with petals from the Dragoon Lillies of Shamonasche.

"Not bad," he says, sighing and putting his cup on the gold-coated table with a clink.

Missy reaches out, snake-fast, grips his wrist. He feels the cold tendrils of her mind skimming through his scalp, reaching into the back of his brain, accessing his occipital lobe.

Missy squints at him, across the table. "My eyes are up here, Doctor."

"I wasn't - I've been reading your book upside down. It's good, isn't it?"

"I know, don't spoil it for me. Woah." Missy waves a hand in the air between them both. "You need glasses."

The Doctor blinks, lets Missy in properly. His vision swims for a moment, is tinged bluer, gets sharper. His peripheral vision narrows slightly. 

"Now check him out," Missy says. "Now, Doctor."

He looks at her, and gets the rushing sense of vertigo feeding back from Missy, as she processes looking at herself.

"Ugh, I feel sick."

"I don't think you want to see him, Missy," the Doctor says, and Missy looks at him, and he looks at her, and she looks at herself, and his stomach roils. "Missy - "

"Doctor."

The Doctor tuts, recrosses his legs and happens to bump his pen off the table. It lands with a click on the diamond-inlaid floor -

"This place is so tacky," he sighs, leaning down, and in the process, accidentally glancing over at the young man alone at the table on the opposite side of the room. The Doctor collects his pen, sits back up. "Missy?"

She sits back in her chair, blue eyes wide, and the Doctor feels her mind leaving his with the sense of a drop of water deep in his ear.

"I was expecting - you," she says, quietly. "Not me." Then, she looks up. "My coffee is ready, could you get it?"

"Get it yourself," says the Doctor, picking up his super-sudoku, trying to act casual.

"I'll get vertigo if I stand up after being in your head. You're too tall."

Missy stares at him. He stares at Missy. Gives up and stands, tosses his sudoku into her lap and goes over to the counter. He gets a plate of biscotti too, totes them both over to their table and armchairs. Missy stands as he approaches, glances at the young man again.

"Actually, Doctor," says Missy, absently, frowning. "Could you - "

The Doctor looks at the young man, dark red hair falling about his face, carefully drinking the same coffee as Missy, attempting to blend in, and twigs. Looks back at her. "Pronoun swap? What to?" It's clumsy, when this happens in English, and he's glad they've picked Gallifreyan. Gladder still that Missy tends to drop in volume when it's just the two of them catching up and talking. "You wish to swap pronouns? I shall respect this once you tell me your preference" is one middling word in their language.

"They," says Missy absently, and the Doctor nods, puts their coffee in front of them. "It always gets - odd, when I see one of my earlier selves. Granted, ninety percent of the time, it's because I remember seeing myself and thinking I'm incredibly attractive, then realising that was me I was attracted to - "

"Biscotti?" asks the Doctor.

"Please," Missy says, nodding and taking it. "Oh, is this Nutella? It's a delicacy in this quadrant."

The Doctor sits opposite them, cups his face in his hands. "What were you doing here, anyway?"

Missy gestures about the club. "This is a step down from the grandeur of the Citadel, sure, but it's not the plunge that say…Earth is."

"If you say so." says the Doctor, watches them nibbling at their biscotti. "Do you think I'll get dysphoria, sometimes, when I regenerate and change - "

" _When_?" Missy snorts. "More _if_. You say that like you have any kind of control over your regenerative ability. You go blonde and brown, skinny and chubby, and that's the only variation on your theme, my love."

"I do so - "

Missy, damn them, does that thing where they raise an eyebrow at him, and the Doctor clears his throat. Missy giggles as he twists, takes his coat from where it's hanging on the back of his chair, and holds it over his lap.

"You've wanted to be ginger for - what - " Missy casts their gaze around the market again. "Two point - oh, seven million years? I have to ask, my dear."

The Doctor stares over at them, trying to keep his expression grumpy, failing miserably. Missy grins again.

"That coat's not coming off your lap anytime soon, is it."

"You're the worst. And _no_ \- "

"Do you want to be a ginger because I was a ginger?"

The Doctor hides his smile behind his mug. " _No_ , Missy, it's not. And you're not a ginger over there, you're a redhead. Gingers are, ginger. You're auburn."

"You'd be cute with freckles," says Missy, and the Doctor has to put down his mug to hide his face in his hands. "I bet that body would have had freckles when it was younger."

"Your freckles," says the Doctor. "That younger you - "

"Oh, Doctor."

" _Anyway_ , I didn't even say they were cute or not - you're going to make me say it, aren't you. They _were_ , they were, but I must ask. Why did you visit here? It's not exactly a popular place to visit, unless you're a seasoned time traveller. Where did you get the cash?"

"I think," says Missy. "I mean, I was less than two hundred when I left Gallifrey, I suppose I wanted to act like a seasoned time traveller. Walk the walk before I could talk the talk, as the humans say."

"You don't talk about that, when you were first exiled," says the Doctor, and Missy shakes their head. "I did miss you, you know."

"Ah, there he goes, making it all about him," says Missy. "You're not the centre of my universe, you know."

"Could have fooled me lately," says the Doctor. "Wasn't I your boyfriend at one point?"

Missy waves their hand dismissively. "Well, when all of Gallifrey is after you, it's nice to feel like you have someone on your side. Even if that person, is also - " Missy twirls their fingers around. "You know. Public Enemy Number 1, too."

"Wait, am I one, or two?"

"I like to think we're equal first. If it wasn't for the attempted genocide, I'd be on top, you bastard." Missy picks up their coffee. "Gallifreyan enemy number one."

The Doctor reaches over, takes a piece of their biscotti. "I do like it when you're on top," he says, and Missy snorts, spraying coffee everywhere. "Not today," he adds. "Not in the mood today. Please." He grabs one of the 4000-thread count linen-cotton-silk blend napkins, tries to get the worst of the coffee off Missy's skirt, while Missy splutters and laughs. "Least you missed the book." He takes the book, puts it on the table.

"No," says Missy, dabbing at their lapels with their hankie. "No, I understand. And I liked your ponytail."

"What?"

"Your stupid ponytail, when we were kids. You looked like a rebel."

The Doctor gives up on their skirt, sits back with his coffee. "I - "

"I mean, a dorky rebel, but a rebel all the same," Missy says, smiling at him, and it's a proper, genuine smile. They stand, collect their book and the Doctor's sudoku, tucking them in their pockets. "I'm going to pay. Shall we exit via the giftshop? I can't believe a place this classy still has a giftshop."

"Why?"

"You like giftshops," Missy says plainly, and the Doctor smiles down at them. "Come on, old man. Let's leave the past in the past. Just for today."

The Doctor nods, offers them his arm. Missy takes it, and they head for the counter.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback is always appreciated. Thanks for reading!


End file.
